Puzzle Pieces
by RebelzHeart
Summary: It's funny how they all can just click together, like the pieces of a puzzle. A series of fluff oneshots about the Batfam.
1. Origin

**ABOUT THE STORY:** I might follow up this chapter someday with Dick's opinions on the Batman, in the same (or different) style. I'm experimenting with writing styles at the moment, so sorry if it seems kind of bad. There will be **no romance** _,_ maybe I'll hint at the cannon pairings, but I doubt it. I'm not a romance person, so please don't ask for pairings. You can tell me what you want me to write, but just remember that I'm under no obligation to write what you want me to. Thank you, and sorry that you had to read this long paragraph.

* * *

 _He's standing, waiting..._

 _His parents are free, flying..._

 _There's a snap..._

He closes his eyes, and Dick can see his parents falling, can see the blood and hear the sickening crack as their bodies bend in ways that even he can't perform.

"You'll get over it." The child worker assures him, features twisted in sympathy. She looks hesitant to approach him, as though he were made of class.

Maybe he was. He felt like one touch could crack him like an egg.

"It'll be okay," The adults all say, all torsos and legs, he can't make out their faces, too high and blinded by the light. "In just a while, you'll barely remember this happened."

He finds that hard to believe, because every time that he breathes, he can imagine their bodies crumpled on the ground, like a photograph, clear and precise.

"It'll never go away." Bruce is different.

Sympathetic, but not pitying him.

Honest, but not painfully so.

Distant, yet somehow understanding.

"It won't?" They're watching the circus pack up, Dick doing a handstand in the hopes that all the blood rushing to his head will somehow make his brain stop thinking about them, Bruce there in a clean suit, looking so out of place that before the accident, Dick might have laughed at him. "Never?"

"Never," Bruce agrees, his voice weary, as though he's thinking about something but also trying not to, just like Dick. "But that's not a bad thing. It's true that it'll never go away... those imagines in your head, the memories, the knowledge that they're not here anymore. But do you really want to forget them?"

He crouches down, and Dick feels that Bruce is trying to stay on his level, unlike the other adults who were just so high up, tall as mountains.

"If it makes the pain stop." Dick replies, and he feels that he should be ashamed to sound so pathetic, but he mostly feels numb, like this is all just a dream.

"But they are a part of you." Bruce's voice sounds odd, as though he is repeating somebody else's words. (Later, Dick thinks it must be Alfred who said that originally.) "To forget is to lose a part of yourself."

Dick wouldn't like that, but part of him thinks that as long as the choked feeling in his chest is gone, he doesn't care if part of his soul is, too.

"Have you forgotten something?" Dick asks curiously as he springs back, legs bending smoothly so that he can stand up.

There's a slight pause, as though Bruce is thinking very hard about something, and then a quiet, "I don't know."

That makes sense, Dick supposes. "Do you think that you've forgotten something?" He asks promptly, hands folded over each other as he straightens, feeling oddly dirty next to Bruce.

"No..." Bruce shakes his head, thoughtful and old. "I don't know. The man who raised me says that I'm looking for something to complete me."

Like a puzzle. "What are you looking for?" Dick wonders if he also needs something to complete him, and his fingers tap nervously against his leg. He doesn't like the thought that he's incomplete.

Bruce stares at him, still thoughtful, still old. "I don't know." His voice is as rough as grating copper, and yet oddly hollow.

"You don't know much, do you?" Dick asks, unsure if that's rude or not.

A small attempt at a smile lifts up the corner of Bruce's lips. "No, I suppose not." He half laughs, still crouched down.

Dick wonders if Bruce can help him to complete himself.

* * *

The next time that he sees Bruce, they talk some more.

They talk a lot.

Then the day comes where, instead of acting cool and confident, Bruce seems rather nervous.

He keeps glancing at the old man waiting by the door, eyes darting back and forth, like he's trying to look at everything, but nothing at the same time.

Finally, they settle on Dick, and he speaks in a voice of one who's thought a lot about how much they could fail, "Dick, how would you like to live with me?"

Dick gapes, because he hadn't really thought this to be possible, hadn't really considered it, but before he knows it he's dashing towards Bruce and wrapping his arms around him and yelling something incoherent, but he thinks that it must be a yes, because that's what the light feeling in his chest is singing.

He glances at the old man by the door, and catches a fond smile on the old man's lips.

"...Alfred?" He asks, because he thinks that this could only be one man, the one that Bruce is always speaking so fondly of, and the one from whom so much wisdom seems to come.

The old man approaches, and dips into a bow. "Master Richard."

His voice is gravelly, and posh, but Dick likes it, and giggles at the formality. "Should I call you Master Alfred?"

Alfred assures him (very seriously, which makes Dick giggles some more) that doing so is not needed, but Dick has already decided that he'll call Alfred 'Master Alfred'. (He's not quite sure why, but he loves the idea, it's like he's playing pretend.)

Arms still wrapped around Bruce's neck, Dick pulls away to wrap his arms around Alfred, who seems a little stiff, but returns it with fond sincerity.

He casts a glance at Bruce, then unwraps one arm to beckon him closer.

Bruce isn't Papi, Dick thinks.

But Bruce has somehow become very important to Dick, all the same.

 **A/N:** So... yeah, another random fic in a random fandom. Sorry, guys. For those following me, this'll be a bit like Scars, a side project, but with an indefinite amount of chapters. (So I could update like, every day for one month, then take two months for another update, but then it could build up to something like a million chapters if you're patient enough.)


	2. Robin

**A/N:** I'll be honest, I'm not the fondest of this chapter. It's not that good, and it's not what I'm planning for this story. But I wrote it, so it's here. Sorry if you didn't like it, the rest of this story probably won't follow suit to this.

Jason wonders sometimes, if it was right for him to become Robin.

Or rather, if it was right for him to _stay_ Robin.

Because he's so obviously... not Robin.

Like, he is, but at the same time... he's not.

He may have the costume, may have the name, but he's not Dick.

"Is that what this is all about?" Dick laughs upon Jason's confession. "You're trying to live up to _me_?"

He seems to find this very amusing, because he laughs until he cramps up, then he laughs some more, eventually being forced to stop and gasp for breath.

Jason crossed his arms over his chest, unamused. "You're the Golden Boy," He tries to sneer to make it seem less important, less embarrassing. "I can hardly expect you to understand."

"No," Dick stopped laughing to stop and peer at Jason, features earnest and disturbingly fond. "I suppose that you can't. But Robin isn't something to live up to, it's not like it's a mantle or a role to play."

"But it _is_!" Jason snapped as Alfred sets a platter of cookies in between him and Dick, flushing when Alfred raises a curious eyebrow at him. He waited until Alfred was gone, before he repeated, "It is. Being Robin might not have been something to live up to for _you_ , but for me, it is. I have to be as good as you, and you're so sickeningly _perfect_ that it makes me want to puke."

Dick grinned at that, the corners of his lips pulling up in an emotion that Jason couldn't quite identify. "You think that I'm perfect?"

"No, of course not," Jason's nose wrinkled, "I mean, just look at..." He made a vague gesture.

Dick raised an eyebrow. "But you just gestured at all of me." He sounded amused as he grabbed a cookie and bit into it.

"Yeah, that." Jason agreed, sharing a small smile with Dick at the reference as he snatched the cookie from Dick's hands and finished it off. "You're so perfect that you make me want to puke."

Dick frowned, seeming to only partially pay attention to Jason's words. "...You stole my cookie." He whined, crossing his arms unhappily over his chest.

Jason raised an eyebrow. "You wanna fight?" He snorted as he pulled another cookie from the pile.

Dick stuck out his lower lip into a childish pout, but took another cookie from the plate, this time cautiously pulling it to his lips. After Jason spread out his arms and raised an eyebrow, Dick seemed to relax. "So I am perfect." He flashed Jason an amused grin as he bit his new cookie.

"No. Yeah. Maybe." Jason scowled. "Whatever it is, it's disgusting."

Dick laughed at that, cheeks stretching out, eyes softening in something that Jason was sure had to be gross and full of feelings. "So, you want to be like me?" He asked teasingly, waving his cookie with a raise of his brow. "The perfect Golden Boy?"

Jason wanted to scoff, to banter right back, but something odd seemed stuck in his throat, so he could only freeze in horror when the mutter of, "Maybe." stumbled out of his lips.

Dick's laugh freezes, the cookie half hanging from frozen fingers, slack jawed in amazement. Jason vaguely notices a cookie crumb hanging to the right of Dick's nose, too big to be a freckle but too small to be a bug. Then Dick laughs, a slow, uncomfortable sound, unamused and forced, as though he's just waiting for Jason to laugh, "Joking, you dork." Jason wants to say it, but his face is burning and he thinks that if he tries lying right now he'd probably sound quite unconvincing.

"Why?" Dick's voice seems honestly confused, as though he truly doesn't understand how picture perfect he is, how amazing he seems and how highly he's spoken of by everyone.

Jason spots a stain of water on the counter, and he pokes uncomfortably at it, wishing that there was some way for the ground to swallow him. Part of him... the childish, dumb part of him that he'd thought had died out a long time ago... wants to tell Dick how amazing he thinks that he is, how he's always tried to live up to the mantle of Robin. But Dick doesn't _get_ it, and all that he can do is snap an irritated growl of, "Use your brain for once, Golden Boy."

Dick frowns, and his eyes drift over to the water stain as well, his gaze thoughtlessly following Jason's finger as it traces a circle in the table. For a long time, he was silent, and Jason wondered if he really was that puzzled over what he had meant. Then, finally, Dick muttered, arms crossed over his chest as he leaned back, "I'm not the Golden Boy."

Before he could stop himself, a scoff escaped Jason's lips. "Right, and I'm not from Crime Alley."

"I'm not!" Dick snapped, eyebrows drawing together, nose wrinkling. Jason suddenly felt odd staring at Dick, as though it weren't really Dick. With a start, he realized that he'd never seen Dick so serious as himself. (He'd seen it on Nightwing, sure, but on Dick's civilian features it was strange, alien.)

"You _are_!" Jason snarled, fingers curled into fists as he stood up, knocking his chair back. "Maybe you don't see it, but everyone adores you! Dickie-bird, who's perfect and wonderful and can apparently do no wrong. Dickie-bird, who can single handedly take down an army. Dickie-bird, who's morals are perfect, and lovely and..." He let loose a few curse words, fists tight, back straight, chin up. "Maybe you don't see it, but you _are_ the Golden Boy."

Dick lowered his eyes, hands spread out in front of him, shoulders slumped. He looked oddly like a china doll, so perfect and yet fragile. "I'm not." He repeated, voice soft but firm, fingers curling into his palm as his elbows bent back and his hands returned to his lap. "I ran away from this life. Ran away from being Robin, ran away from the idea of becoming Batman. I pushed this onto you, it was my fault that..."

"That what?" Jason demanded. "That I became this? That I became Robin? Was that a mistake?"

"A mistake?" Dick echoed, shaking his head like he was trying to get water out of his ears. "You? Never. When I chose to run, you chose to stay. When I couldn't be Robin, you took up the mantle. Maybe it is something that you have to live up to, but you've done more than life up to it."

Jason's jaw locked, and he asked quietly, "Then why doesn't anyone else think so?"

"Because they've gotten used to seeing a Robin." Dick replied, firm stubbornness spilling back into his voice. "They don't understand what you're doing, even now."

"What am I doing?" Jason scoffed, running his fingers through his hair.

"You're keeping Bruce, Bruce. Robin is the only thing keeping Batman linked to his humanity, Robin is crucial to Bruce staying human, for him caring so much about others." Dick stood up, and took the last cookie, an easygoing smile returning to his features. "You're doing a fantastic job, Jason."

He thinks about that, as he's dying.

About who will become Robin.

Because there will be one... there must be one, to keep Bruce human.

The thought makes him sad, that he wasn't good enough to keep Bruce what he was.

But he'll put his faith in the next Robin.

At least for now.


	3. Awestruck

**Reply to Guest:** Sorry that it was depressing, but I'm happy that you liked it and took the time to review. Thank you very much.

"So, uh, you were the first Robin." Tim rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly, unable to help the hero-worship creeping into his voice. _The first Robin!_ A childish voice fanboy-ed in his head. _You're talking to THE first Robin. You're with THE first Robin, in THE Batcave, to become the NEXT Robin. Stay cool. Stay cool._ Who was he kidding? He couldn't stay cool to save his life. It was all he could do to keep his teeth clamped onto his tongue in an attempt to stay from blurting out something dumb.

Nightwing glanced at him, features amused as he peeled the mask off of his face. "Yeah," He agreed, seeming to understand Tim's plight. "And you're going to be the third." His lips twisted at that slightly, as though he disliked the thought, but his eyes seemed kind, as though he _did_ want Tim to be the next Robin, but simply didn't appreciate the circumstances.

Which Tim could totally understand. (Wasn't that, after all, _why_ he wanted to become Robin? Because Batman just wasn't the same if he didn't have one anymore.)

"Mind if I change?" Nightwing asked, holding up a pile of wrinkled clothes as he tossed his mask onto a nearby chair. He flashed Tim a teasing smile. "Spandex isn't as warm as it looks."

"Yeah, of course not." Tim replied distractedly, eyes flickering over to the screens rising up from the control panel. "Is that what you use to identify your suspects and criminals? Do you just use the police network, or do you have your own?"

"We have our own." Nightwing replied casually as he tossed the wrinkled remains of his suit onto the chair where his mask was and pulled on a jacket, already dressed. ( _That was fast._ Tim hadn't even noticed...) "Bruce used to use the police network, but then I hacked it, and he decided that our own would be safer."

"You hacked it?" Tim repeated, not even bothering anymore to hide the awestruck tone lining his voice.

Nightwing rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "I was trying to access a case that Bruce wouldn't let me work on..." His features twisted in revulsion. "Turns out that he programmed it so that once it detected that it was being hacked, instead of shutting me out, it would subtly change everything to _porn_." Shuddering, his nose wrinkled as he dramatically groaned, "My poor, innocent eyes..."

Tim rolled his eyes, but didn't say anything (he didn't want to offend a hero, not when he'd just started like this) as he toed his way over to the screens. "Awesome." He murmured, running his fingers over the keys. "Do you run custom voice command?"

Nightwing seemed surprised, "No, too much risk of a recording being used or digitally edited."

"But what if you sync it so that any digital interference won't work? And if you add a command like this..." He typed distractedly into the screen, barely allowing it to turn on before his fingers blurred over the keyboard. "...then magically altered or physical voice imitation won't work either. Of course, you'd need to upgrade your voice recognition, get better software, but I think I've got something like that in my attic somewhere."

"You can make it so that magic won't work?" Nightwing leaned forwards, arms crossed over the chair behind Tim's head, fingers brushing against Tim's shoulder. "Even I can't do that."

"Obviously it's not foolproof." Tim admitted, "But then again, with magic, nothing ever really is."

"True," Nightwing acknowledged, a wide smile spreading across his features. "This is awesome! You're like, the smartest Robin ever!" He paused, and then clapped his hands over his mouth. "What have I just said?" He gasped, "No, I've just blasphemed _myself_!"

Tim laughed, "With an ego like that, you'd never say anything to hurt your own feelings."

Nightwing pressed his hands against his hips, raising an eyebrow as he put one hand up, shaking his finger. "You did not just call me egotistical." He whined, voice high pitched and imitating a teenage girl.

"No, I didn't," Tim agreed, features smug, "You just did that to yourself."

"I did no such... you little brat!"

Laughing, Tim sprung up from the chair as Nightwing lunged forwards, eventually catching him and ticking him until he begged for mercy.

 _So, this was the first Robin._

Ha, and he'd thought that this was going to be intimidating.

...ah, but...

Offering Nightwing a sheepish smile once they had finally gotten their laughter under control, he asked in the most casual way he could (which was not very casual, considering his beet red cheeks and the awkward shrug of his shoulders), "So... what was your name again?"

By the time that Nightwing (who's name apparently was Dick, though he'd had to find out through _Alfred_ of all people, just because he'd been dumb enough to forget and Dick had held it a secret over him for practically forever... three days, to be exact) had finished getting through with Tim, his sides were aching from all the laughter.

He wouldn't trade this for the world.

Maybe for a chance to get back at Nightwing.

But not for the world.

 **A/N:** So... Tim. I really don't know how to write Tim. Did I do okay? Did I do badly? I really can't write Tim that well, so I'm sorry. But I love him, too, so it's just... anywho, this stuff's not in chronological order (I mean, it is so far, but it won't be in the future) so sorry about that. Yeah...


	4. MBTI

**Reply to Guest:** Thanks! I'm glad to know that you thought that it was cute.

"Jay-jay, Jay-jay, JAY-JAY!" Barreling into the room, Dick smashed into Jason, laptop firmly clasped in his hands. Tossing the laptop onto a nearby couch, he neatly sprung forwards, hands lightly pushing against the edge of the couch before he landed neatly in front of Jason, noses practically touching as he bent his knees to soften his landing.

Jason leaned back, features cool with irritation. "No." He snapped, burying his nose further into his phone.

"Buuut, _Jaaay-Jay_!" Dick whined childishly as he crossed his arms over his chest. "You haven't even heard what I wanted to do yet!"

"And I never want to hear another one of your dumb ideas ever again." Jason retorted, pressing his back uncomfortably into his sofa as Dick leaned forwards eagerly. Scowling, Jason pressed his hands against the arms of his sofa and pushed himself up, legs already swinging into action as he leaped back and tipped the sofa backwards, Dick letting out a startled yelp as the sofa smashed onto the ground with a loud _thump_.

Dick pulled on the edge of the sofa, pushing it back into place as he used it to spring himself up and land behind it, right in front of Jason. (Again. Yeesh, he was like a parasite.) "Look, _just because_ the ice cream incident didn't go well..."

"You swore that you'd never mention that again." Jason hissed, pushing Dick's face to the side with his left foot.

"If I never mention it again, will you listen to me?" Dick asked hopefully as he batted Jason's foot away. "Ew, do you _ever_ wash your socks?"

Jason stuck out his tongue, tone becoming offended as he sulked, "I changed them yesterday."

Dick wrinkled his nose, "Okay, when was the last time you had a _bath_?" When Jason opened his mouth to protest, Dick shook his head and waved a hand carelessly. "You know what, never mind. _So_ , I was online and stuff just a few minutes earlier, right? And then I was just, like, browsing online and then I found this thing..."

"LALALALALALALA!" Jason sang loudly, clapping his hands over his ears as he backpedaled away from Dick. "I CAN'T HEAR YOU~"

Dick lunged forwards, just barely managing to catch onto Jason's wrists as he wrapped his legs around Jason's waist. "IT'S A QUIZ THAT TELLS YOU WHO YOU ARE!" He yelled as he pressed a foot against Jason's chest in a ridiculous attempt to pull Jason's hands away from his ears. "IT'S... CALLED..."

Jason's hands popped off from the side of his head and Dick lost his grip, sent sprawling back to the ground as Jason snickered unrepentant.

Scowling, Dick glared at Jason (not very effectively, since he was sprawled awkwardly on the ground, but a good attempt nonetheless), and repeated (a tad sulkily), "It's called the Myers Briggs test, and it's awesome."

"A test?" Jason repeated, nose scrunching in distaste. "Ugh, I thought that the replacement was the one that liked those. Now you're affected, too?"

Dick rolled his eyes. "It's a _personality_ test." He replied haughtily, as though that cleared up everything.

Which, really, it did. Personality tests were Dick's thing... he found it fascinating and amusing how people just assumed that they could box others into specific types of personalities. He was always asking (read: _begging, pleading, forcing with sheer annoyingness)_ the others to do it, and then found the results amusing. (Because personality tests were always just so wrong... but they always got a good kick out of it.)

But never had he seemed so... excited.

"What, did it tell you that you were destined for some great evil?" Jason drawled as he started to step away, an odd mixture of murderous irritation and fondness for Dick swelling up in his chest as Dick clung childishly to his leg, allowing Jason to drag him across the floor. "How inaccurate was it, for you to want me to do it so badly?"

"It's _accurate_!" Dick replied, wriggling his way up Jason's leg like a sloth. (Jason swore that Dick was a five year old in a 16 year old's body. He could just _swear_ it. He would bet his chocolate stash on it. Well, maybe not his chocolate stash, but still...) "It's like it can read my miiind."

"Right." Suitably unimpressed, Jason shook his leg and pushed Dick off. Reluctantly, he kept going, and asked, "So, this test can read your mind. What's it called?"

Dick's features lit up, and Jason wondered if it was too late to take back the words, because Dick was already babbling a mile a minute, excitedly explaining that; "It's called the Myers Briggs test and it's superduper cool because it just asked a few questions and then it was like fwooyah and kyuupow and then I got this result and at first I was like haha, but then I was like whoooa because it made sense and..."

Jason gaped at Dick in disbelief, his eyes twitching slightly. "What happened to your vocabulary?" He demanded, horrified as he crouched down.

Dick flipped himself into a standing position, legs quickly bending into a cross legged position. "I was watching this cartoon..." He started, sheepishly rubbing at the back of his head.

"Say no more." Jason groaned, holding up a hand as he closed his eyes. "So, Myers Briggs, was it? I think that I've heard of that..."

"I bet you have!" Dick nodded, lips stretched out even further. "It's super cool!"

"Alright, fine." Jason raised an eyebrow. "Then how come you haven't told the replacement and the demon brat?"

Dick's eyes widened as his mouth formed an 'o'. "IforgotgottagosorryJayJaybebacksoonsorryawesomethanks!" He yelled as he skipped back, tumbling backwards as his fingers lightly pulled his laptop from the couch and placed it on Jason's lap. "It's already ready!" He called out, still running backwards. "Just start it while I go talk to Ti-" Dick's back slammed into the wall, and he let loose a swear word as he rubbed the back of his head.

Jason snickered, "Yeah, yeah, whatever!" He rolled his eyes, "Just get going."

"Yeah!" And with that, Dick was gone.

Jason cast a glance at the laptop. _If I don't do it, Dick'll be on me for_ months _..._ He mused as he started filling in the bubbles.

 _May as well._

After all, what harm could be done?

(Famous last words.)

 **A/N:** Um, help? I don't actually know what everyone's MBTI would be, so if any of you have an opinion, please tell me. Should I include Dick's conversation with Tim and Damian as well?


End file.
